INTONATION: WHAT IS IT GOOD FOR? CHRISTOPHER KEARNS THE NEW SCHOOL

INTRODUCING INTONATION According to Thornbury (2006), intonation is the meaningful use that speakers make of changes in their voice pitch. It is said to be used for: Grammatical function, such as indicating the difference between statements and questions Attitudinal function, such as indicating interest, surprise, boredom, and so on - what is called high and low involvement Discoursal function, such as contrasting new information with information that is already known, and hence shared between speakers (p. 110)

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK (BRAZIL) The tone unit and tonic syllable Prominence: “the name given to a property that is not inherent, like accent, but only associated with a word by virtue of its function as a constituent part of a tone unit” (Coulthard, p. 102). Tone (Dalton & Siedlhofer, 1995, p. 62). Key “Relative level of pitch within an utterance” (Finch, p. 50) high key – contrastive mid key – additive low key – equative Termination “…for each tonic syllable, as well as choosing pitch movement, the speaker chooses to begin, in the case of falling tones, or end, in the case of rising tones, with high, mid or low pitch” (Coulthard, 1977, p. 115 ).

“With his termination choice a speaker predicts or asks for a particular key choice and therefore by implication a particular meaning from the next speaker” (Coulthard, 1977, p. 115) Rising or falling questions? Termination, not tone carries the function of eliciting. GRAMMATICAL FUNCTION Question or statement? (Coulthard, 1977, p. 117) (Coulthard, 1977, p. 118)

ATTITUDINAL FUNCTION (Finch, p ) “These meanings seem to depend … far too much on ‘the co-occurrence of particular lexical items’” (Brazil, 1975, in Coulthard, 1977 p. 98). “At that level of generality we have ceased to say anything very interesting” (Finch, p. 52).

“Intonation is crucially concerned with marking situationally informative items” (Coulthard, 1977, p. 104). JOHNNY will eat this [not someone else.] Johnny WILL eat this [whether he wants to or not.] (Dalton & Siedlhofer, 1995, p. 55). DISCOURSAL FUNCTION: ORGANIZING SPEECH Conversation is interactive Pitch signals the desire to hold on to or give up the floor. (Dalton & Seidlhofer) Chris: Charlie, tell me about that show you were just watching. Charlie: It’s called Avatar. It’s about a boy can bend air. Chris: Is it fantasy? Charlie: Erm, yeah. Chris: Ok, never mind then. Topic and Prominence Turn-taking

MORE DISCOURSAL FUNCTIONS Common Ground Dominance Speakers’ rights are not always equal, one is dominant or claims dominance r+ invokes the common ground (Coulthard, 1977, p. 109) p+ adds information both to the common ground and to the speaker’s own store of knowledge (Coulthard, 1977, p. 110) (Coulthard, 1977, p. 106)

“Intonation is a property of connected discourse rather than of isolated sentences or grammatical structures” (Thornbury, 2006, p. 110) Discourse gives a holistic view which can explain question forms and give attitudinal information WHICH FUNCTION IS MOST IMPORTANT?

PEDAGOGICAL APPLICATIONS “The tendency is for intonation to go down and up at the end of questions and down on other types of sentence” (Carr & Witherick, 2011, p. 30) Starter Upper Intermediate Encourages p+ tone to show emphatic agreement The alternative r tone would invite disagreement Encourages use of p tone for statements Use of rising tone, r+, would claim dominance and sound aggressive Encourages use of r tone for questions (Eales & Oakes, 2011, p. 14) (Eales & Oakes, 2012, p. 14)

Discoursal function is most useful as a perspective for academic purposes Most comprehensive analysis Explains both grammatical moods and attitudes Requires knowledge of complex theoretical framework Explanations of attitude and grammar choice are more useful in the classroom CONCLUSIONS

REFERENCES Dalton, B. & Seidlhofer, C. (1995). Pronunciation. Oxford, England: Oxford University press. Coulthard, M. (1977). An introduction to discourse analysis. London: Longman. Eales F., & Oakes, S. (2011). Speak Out: upper intermediate student’s book. Harlow, England: Pearson Education Limited. Eales F., & Oakes, S. (2011). Speak Out: starter student’s book. Harlow, England: Pearson Education Limited. Finch. Phonetics and Phonology. Comyns Carr, J., & Witherick, N. (2011). Speak Out: upper intermediate teacher’s resource book. Harlow, England: Pearson Education Limited. Thornbury, S. (2006). An A-Z of ELT : A dictionary of terms and concepts used in English language teaching. Oxford: Macmillan Education.